Standing on the decks of warships, a thousand men were ordered to strip to the waist to watch Britain’s first nuclear bomb blast.

Three hours later some were sent to the island where the 20 kiloton device had exploded to be filmed for a propaganda movie. It was a radio­active hell and they were peppered by toxic black rain from the fallout.

Sixty years on, the few surviving veterans from that October day in 1952 struggle towards death, ­riddled with cancers and diseases linked to radiation poisoning.

Their children were 10 times more likely to have birth deformities and five times more likely to die in infancy. Their grandchildren suffered eight times the national rate of Down’s syndrome and six times the rate of leukaemia.

Generations poisoned forever by a blinding white flash and denied justice by a mushroom cloud of sil­ence. Of the nuclear powers Britain is the only one not to recognise and compensate atomic veterans. Instead it gave them Nuclear Test Medals.

Today four survivors talk to the Sunday Mirror, which 10 years ago launched a campaign to make the MoD admit the truth.

One, former Royal Engineer Thomas Wilson, 80, told us: “The MoD are just waiting for us to die.”

We have seen top secret papers warning there was little idea of the dangers servicemen faced in Operation Hurricane which took place on October 3 in the Monte Bello islands off Western Australia.

While they were stripped to the waist, civilian scientists involved got special protection from the bomb which was as powerful as the one that devastated Nagasaki and ended World War Two.

The mushroom cloud was 50 miles across and dropped a black rain of poisoned seawater on to the men. The documents show scientists were concerned about X-rays released by the bomb, but ignored beta ­radiation in tiny fallout particles absorbed by the body.

One damning sentence says: “This was not fully understood and there was no operational evidence regarding the protective value of relatively light clothing.”

After Operation Hurricane, the British continued setting off bombs at dozens of tests on mainland Australia and Christmas Island in the South Pacific. A total of 22,000 servicemen were involved, and at least 19,000 are now dead.

Another of our survivors, Stanley Jacobs, 81, said of the radiation still in his bone marrow: “Everyone with any sense accepts the likely cause of all this. Except the MoD.

“It’s not just us affected. It’s our children and theirs too.”

Our campaign

In October 2002 we began our fight for ­official recognition that nuclear bomb tests were responsible for the men’s radiation poisoning.

We continue to demand compensation for survivors now dying at a rate of three a month.

A group of 1,000 veterans won the right to take the MoD to court in 2009, but the government has delayed the trial.Many are taking their fight to the European Court of Human Rights.

TREVOR Roberts was 18 and on HMS Campania as a ­meteorological observer.

He said: “We faced aft and a bright flash went past us. Then we were told to turn around.

“After the bomb the ship sailed back to the island and we were allowed ashore to swim and mess about.”

Trevor, now 78, has had two cancerous growths removed from his face. He has been diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, a terminal condition seen in survivors of nuclear accidents.

He also has a son with breathing problems.

He said: “I just want to live long enough to see the MoD admit what it did.”

(Image: JK PRESS)

FORMER Royal Engineer Thomas Wilson, 80, was ordered on to the island after the blast. “We were called on deck and told, ‘You, you and you’. I had no choice,” he said.

He was driven across Ground Zero in a Land ­Rover and filmed. “I got great

lungfuls of sand,” said ­widower Thomas.

In a few hours he soaked up a fifth of the radiation most of us absorb in a lifetime. Afterwards he lost several teeth. He is now ­going blind for an unknown reason and has had his gall bladder ­removed.

Of his five children, four have had serious blood, bone and thyroid ­problems. One grandchild has severe ­cerebral palsy.

(Image: Sunday Mirror)

ABLE seaman Bill Clarkson was ordered to live close to the blast site for weeks to clear radioactive debris.

He was given a dose meter and had radiation readings taken, but he’s never been told the results.

Now 82, he has myelomonocytic leukaemia linked to radiation ­exposure. The pensioner, from Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, also has a lymphoproliferative disorder which can only be caused by gen­etic mutation. Doctors have asked him to donate his bone marrow for research

One of his great grandchildren was born with her bladder outside her body. He said “I don’t understand why the MoD says nothing happened to us.”

(Image: Sunday Mirror)

ENGINEER Stanley Jacobs watched the blast seven miles away and recalls: “There was an almighty flash. I was stood behind a chap and I could see all the bones in his skeleton.”

After being told to turn around he saw “a massive cloud. A tidal wave came towards us. It subsided, but it still made the ship rock. And there was a hot wind”.

Years later during a knee replacement, Stanley’s bone marrow was found to be radioactive.

Stanley, 81, of Frimley Surrey, and wife Eileen had two stillborn children. One son had a stroke at 36 caused by a blood vessel that was deformed before his birth.